


Choosing to Heal

by likehandlingroses



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Just Right-verse fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-17
Updated: 2017-11-17
Packaged: 2019-02-03 10:26:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12746454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/likehandlingroses/pseuds/likehandlingroses
Summary: A heated encounter with her father in a grocery store leaves Belle remembering the past and looking to the future.





	Choosing to Heal

Belle scanned the shelves of spices at the grocery store. They couldn’t possibly be out of cinnamon...and yet it didn’t appear to be anywhere.

“It’s the last thing on my list, too,” she said under her breath, reaching out a hand to stroke Gideon’s head, her eyes still searching for the missing spice. Gideon, who could finally sit upright in the front of the cart, was enjoying his ride about the grocery store immensely. He had already been fawned over by three customers (one of whom had tried to grab his hand without so much as asking; Belle had very nearly smacked the woman, but Gideon didn’t seem to mind so she’d settled for a glare).

Finally, Belle spotted the cinnamon and grinned.

“There it is,” she said, snatching a bottle. “Look at that! We found it, didn’t we?”

Gideon smiled at her and reached for the container of cinnamon. Belle laughed and shook her head.

“Oh, I’d bet you’d love to play with the glass, wouldn’t you? That’d be fun to throw on the floor. How about another toy?” She reached into her purse and procured one of Gideon’s favorite play things: a plastic container of mints. “There you go.”

Gideon accepted the replacement with enthusiasm, and Belle turned her cart around towards the register. With any luck, she’d be home before Gideon grew fussy. He was a sweet tempered baby, but some afternoons had been tricky lately, and she didn’t want to risk a public tantrum.

As she turned around, she stopped in her tracks. Her father was on the end of the aisle, looking at pasta sauces. Before Belle could think what to do, he’d seen her. For a moment, his face lit up.

“Belle!”

“Hi,” she said, quietly, as though she were out of breath. She hadn’t seen him in months. Not since Gideon had come back to them. She took a few steps towards him, but stopped again when she saw her father’s eyes drop down to look at Gideon. Any joy she’d seen on his face vanished and was replaced by something like disgust.

Belle wanted to shield Gideon from the scathing look, fearful that somehow he might see and understand what it meant. It hurt enough to know that her own father saw her as a disappointment. But her child? His only crime was existing, and it was clear from her father’s expression that such a crime might be unforgivable.

And it angered her. What right did he have to see her child-- _any_ child, but especially hers--as a mistake? She stood up taller, hands gripping the shopping cart as though she were aiming to mold the blue plastic. However, her father’s gaze never left Gideon, nor did it soften.

“I’d heard about him,” he murmured. “He’s the one who caused all that trouble a while back.”

Gideon gave a playful squeal, and Belle broke her intense stare to give her son a wide smile.

“Yes, he’s a positive rascal,” she said, giving his tummy a tickle.

“You think now that you’re raising him, it’ll be different, don’t you?” Her father said, finally looking at Belle. “That you can save him? Even with that monster still in the house, with his blood running through that boy’s veins?”

For a moment, Belle felt quite small under her father’s gaze. In another life, he’d been a ruler, powerful and in control. Great, even. Or at least he had seemed so when Belle was a girl. And yet, as she looked at him again, he only seemed very angry. Cruel, even, to speak with such hatred about a child. His own grandson.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. And you’d know that if you cared to speak to me about anything,” Belle felt her cheeks getting hot. That was never good. She was getting ready to do some foolish.

The trouble was, once her cheeks got hot, she usually didn’t care what happened next.

“As though you would listen even if I tried,” her father said.

“See? That’s what I’m talking about! I just want to talk to you. _With_ you. As adults. Not be lectured to, Father! Or scolded or shamed or whatever else you think might make me start living my life the way you think is best.”

He looked surprised, at first, at her anger. He’d never been able to read her, never understood why she did the things she did. Never appreciated why his patronizing was so repulsive to her. And yet, after a beat, he was back in control, though his own face was now showing patches of red.

“If you’re asking me to pretend I think it’s acceptable that you’re raising a child with that man to make you feel better, I won’t-”

“-I’m asking you to see me as a person who you love. Who loves you. Not something you have to approve or disapprove of. Of course, I want you to be happy with my life. Because _I’m_ happy. But more than that, I just want to share it with you, and know that it’s okay to do that. Even if you don’t agree with everything in it.”

“You think I don’t want you to be happy? Of course I do. Why do you think I-”

“-tried to take my memories from me? Or keep me asleep forever? Or just...ignored me, hoping I’d come crying to you when things went wrong? And they have gone wrong! More than a few times, and I didn’t talk to you about it. And it’s because I don’t trust you not to take advantage.”

Belle knew she was shouting now, and gods knew who else was there to see the spectacle she was creating. She half hoped Gideon would start crying and pull her out of her anger. But Gideon remained silent, and remembering he was there only made it worse. Because there was something else that angered her, something else she’d realized about her father.

“You know something?” Belle continued. “When Gideon was...the way he was? I thought at first that Rumple wanted our son to be evil, to make things easier for himself. But he didn’t. He wanted what was best for Gideon, and he fought for that. Even when it meant changing the way he looked at the world. And I realized...what I thought he was doing? The kind of father I was afraid he’d be? That’s not the kind of father he is; that’s the kind of father _you_ are. And until that changes? I don’t have anything else to say to you.”

“Belle-”

He didn’t have a chance to say anything else, for Gideon--as though on cue--let out a preliminary sob, suggesting Belle had about two minutes before her son would cause even more of scene than she just had.

She ran her hand over his head, ruffling his hair, and then looked at her father.

“I have to go home,” she said. And that was that.

She felt increasingly sick the whole way home as the severity of what had transpired crept up on her. Gideon was now screaming in the back, and try as she might to soothe him from the driver’s seat, there wasn’t much she could do to placate a hungry, tired baby. Nevertheless, she tried, perhaps harder than she usually did, as though cooing and and hushing Gideon might calm her own unsettled nerves.

As she pulled into the drive of their home, she saw Rumple come out the front door. She’d forgotten he’d be home, almost forgotten he’d existed, she’d been so distracted.

“I saw you drive up!” Rumple said as Belle opened the door. “Am I carrying Gideon or the bags?”

“Gideon,” she said. “Thanks.”

Rumple nodded and opened the backseat. Seeing his father for the first time since that morning stopped Gideon’s cries for a moment, though as Rumple started to unbuckle him from his car seat, he started screaming again with renewed vigor.

“Oh, it’s not so bad as that, is it?” Rumple said, picking Gideon up. “It’s not so bad as that...you’re home now, look. And Papa’s here. He’s right here now. Everyone’s together, right? We’ll get it sorted out.”

He looked at Belle, who was shutting the trunk with her elbow. “How long has he been fussing?”

Belle swallowed back an overwhelming sense of nausea at the memory of what had happened.  
“He started just before we left the store.”

Rumple nodded. “I’ll get him a bottle,” he said before looking down at Gideon. “Does that sound good to you?”

He kissed the top of Gideon’s head and continued on into the house. Belle followed, and soon the afternoon routine was in full swing. She put away groceries and started cutting up food for dinner while Rumple handled feeding Gideon. As soon as he saw his father getting the bottle ready, Gideon began to quiet himself, though he still shook with little, hiccuping sobs until the bottle was in his mouth.

“That’s better, huh? That’s better,” Rumple murmured. “Are you happy now? Oh, you are, aren’t you?”

Belle turned to them and saw Gideon smile, the bottle falling out of his mouth as he did so. Rumple chuckled.

“You’re just about the most precious thing in all the realms, you know that? You do, don’t you?” He bent his head down to nuzzle Gideon’s forehead. “Oh, I missed you.”

It occurred to Belle--as it sometimes did, and probably always would--that in a reality not far removed from their own, this would not have happened. That in a time and place which came moments away from existing, Gideon might never have seen his father. That in still another reality--one they had stared down the face of--he had grown up without either of his parents. And the loss and anguish that would have taken their present joy’s place...she’d seen the barest glimpse of it after Gideon had left with the Blue Fairy, and it was almost too horrible for her to imagine it continuing for the rest of forever.

For all of them, life would have been broken and ragged, missing something it ought to have had. Perhaps some things would have healed, after a time. But nothing, absolutely nothing, could have healed the wounds that cut the deepest.

She wasn’t sorry that she’d tried to do what she had, then. But she was sorry--would always be sorry--that she had felt the need to, that such pain, such irreversible estrangement, had come so close to decimating their family. And she was eternally grateful that Rumple had found a way to prove to himself, and to everyone else, that he could be trusted with the love and joy a family would give him.

Because he had. He was flourishing, even more quickly than she’d dared to hope. Being a father came naturally to him, and as he settled back into the role he’d lived his whole life for the sake of playing, he seemed to find it much easier to set everything else inside of him in order.

Their relationship would take more time to repair. It was good, now. Better than she’d thought it could be again. But there were cracks and fissures in the foundation that would require many more conversations, hours of reflection, and layers of trust before they would smooth over. Having Gideon didn’t fix their problems.

However, as she watched Rumple and Gideon, she guessed that it hadn’t hurt matters to see the two people she loved most in the world love each other so profoundly.

Back when Gideon had still been grown, during the one day they’d spent together, he’d remarked that he hadn’t known what to expect from Rumple.

“I had your note, but nothing from him. And The Black Fairy...well, I knew she was his mother. And he was the Dark One. And I’d hoped--mostly because I had to--that he was better than she was, that he was good somehow. But I didn’t expect...I’m not sure what I’m trying to say,” he’d stumbled, somewhat bewildered at the existence of what he was trying to describe. “I suppose I didn’t expect him to love me so much. Right from the start, whether I deserved it or not.”

The memory of her son’s shy smile as he considered what he’d said was superseded by an image of what had happened that day, of her father’s disgusted expression looking at Gideon. Looking at her.

In another moment, she was crying. Rumple stood up as if to go comfort her, though, as his hands were full, there wasn’t much he could do.

“What’s the matter? Here, come sit down. Actually...here--we’ll go in the living room. Whatever it is, it’ll be alright.”

Once they were settled on the couch, Rumple asked her again what had happened, and Belle told him without hesitation. For she had to tell someone, she realized. That sick feeling would never leave if she didn’t.

“It was humiliating,” she finished. “I don’t even remember if anyone else was there to hear. I just got so angry, I lost track of everything else.”

“It sounds as though he was the one to start it,” Rumple said. Belle couldn’t read his expression.

“Yes, but I’m the one who made it an event,” Belle lamented. “But how could he look at Gideon and feel anything but love? His own grandson? It was so hateful, the way he looked at him. The way he looked at _me_. He says he loves me...but I don’t see how there’s a way forward with him. ”

“Maybe there isn’t one. Or maybe it’s something that isn’t clear yet. Either way, it’s not for you to worry about. It’s his job to take the next step.”

Belle knew he was right, and yet the words only made her feel worse. She swallowed back a sob, and Rumple cocked his head to one side.

“What is it?” he asked.

“What if he doesn’t?” Belle replied. “Take the next step, I mean. What if he decides it’s not worth it?”

“Then he’s a fool. And it’s his own fault, if he loses his family.” Now Belle knew he was angry, though he was still trying to hide it. Something hard and steely had entered his voice. In times past, it would have worried her, hearing that. Now, she trusted that anger would make its way through Rumple without causing too much trouble.

It didn’t make her feel much better, but Belle knew there was nothing more Rumple could say.

“I miss my mother. She would have loved Gideon.”

Rumple’s eyes softened. “I’m sorry, Belle.”

Belle nodded in thanks, then smiled. It hurt to remember her mother, but there was something special about it, too. Like coming home after a long time away, and realizing that your home has its own particular scent.

“You know, I think she would have liked you, too,” Belle remarked, looking at Rumple. “After a fashion. She’d have admired that you didn’t give up on yourself, in the end. She always loved stories like that.”

“Well, what’s nice in books isn’t always quite the same as what’s nice to have in the family,” Rumple said with a small laugh. “But even if she hated me...I’d rather she were here with you. I know how much she meant to you.”

“She did. And she meant a lot to him, too. Or at least that’s what I always thought. I’m sorry for him that he’s going to lose all of this,” Belle said. “Because I love him, and I’d forgive him if he wanted that. If he was sorry. And Gideon would love him. Look at him--he loves everyone.”

And, indeed, Gideon--who had finished his bottle and had his head on his father’s shoulder--grinned at his mother as soon as he realized she was looking at him.

“He’s a sweet boy,” Rumple said. “You want to hold him?”

“Yes, please.” Belle reached for Gideon, who lazily placed one of his arms out as well.

“Look at that,” Rumple said. “He still loves being with you best.”

He said it with such joy that Belle could have kissed him. And she almost did. But there was something still weary inside of her, still lost after what had happened that day. And so she settled for resting her head on his shoulder and letting him place his arm around her.

It would take time to heal from the realization she’d made that day. But, after all, she’d found her way back to happiness after much worse.


End file.
